Confession: This Semester

Before I get into this’n it’s been freeing to say, “I was wrong.” At the end of the summer I planned out the semester, 12 hours of classes didn’t seem too bad. I’d taken a couple grad level classes before in undergrad so it seemed like it’d be doable. Mom said it was too much – she was right, I wasn’t.

It’s safe to say this has been one of the most difficult semesters I’ve had. Sure some undergrad semesters were hard, and when finals came they were really gross, but this one is taking the cake in the realm of stress, tiredness and changes. There’ve been a few breakdowns.

Taking the workload from school, the job at the church, fostering a new relationship and the normal things of life all together has been rich and difficult. Rich because there’s much to learn and much to be humbly amazed by; difficult because I’m prideful and thought I knew it all and this has been three months of being wrong. (In some ways I feel like a raw blister - hyperaware of failures.)

Yet there are three thoughts, which have made this semester more bearable:

1) Bear your burdens well.

Sure they’re heavy and sure they’re daunting, but they’ve been given to you by God to bear, so bear them well. Be emboldened by the simple fact of knowing God – for his own reasons – planned this.

 2) It’s good to be carefree.

When the moments of relaxing come, take them. Whether they’re on Skype, a phone call, staring at the stars from my front porch, in a book, with the roommates, or holding a sleeping nephew whenever and wherever learn to relax in a moment. 

 3) (This has been the most difficult to remember) your biggest problem has been taken care of by Jesus.

This one is beautiful. At the end of any day you can lay your head down on your pillow and remember it’s not your education that saves you, your job that saves you, your interactions that save you, but it’s Jesus’ death on a Roman cross two-thousand years ago that has saved you.

Sure I don’t remember all of these all the time. But at the end of my life – whenever that may be – this semester will be just a simple dark place in the patchwork of life – the dark tiles of a mosaic without which the picture is lost. You see it’s a perspective thing seeing life from the vantage point of farther along.

For Mother's Day

What my mother means to me:

Graciousness.

Mercifulness.

Lovely.

Tenderness.

Boldness.

Gentleness.

Kindness.

My mom is an amazing woman. While working a professional job saving lives, she raised two kids. She put up with the antics of my dad (and mine, ‘cause raising a boy is straight sanctification I assume) and did so in a way that bespeaks godly, biblical submission to his authority. (That is not to say my upbringing was in any way chauvinistic. It is to say my dad was/is the spiritual leader.)

Mother’s day, the day to celebrate what mom has done for her kids.

For protecting her kids like a bear.

For being the only one to console a broken heart.

For being the nurse to fix scrapped knees.

For saving tiny shoes and old pictures.

For the correction little sinners need.

For the tears at our graduations and awards.

For the life of love given to another.

 Yet, some have lost their mom. Whether from the slow wear of time, cancer, or suddenness of a car wreck she won’t be around this Sunday. Indeed, eventually, most of us will face the time where we bid our final goodbye and try to remember her as she was.

So Mother’s Day might as well be another way to say unconditional-love-care-support-gentleness-kindness-and-protection Day -- for all. The druggy on the street corner, the friends who have lost her, the kids who know her, and everyone else, ‘cause mom was always there for me and what better way to celebrate who my mom is than to imitate her?